Sorceress Paradox
by EarthHeartIdiot
Summary: "Some of you are familiar with my lecture on the Chicken and the Egg paradox," Rinoa said. Selphie and Quistis nodded, they discussed this very topic from her Philosophy class multiple times over their coffee dates. "... Dr. Odine and I have found a very possible link between the beginnings of Sorceress powers and Ultimecia..." And so began a new adventure for our heroes.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I do not own any rights to the Final Fantasy franchise or characters.

Author's note: Hey guys, long time since I've written anything, bear with me while I get back in the swing of things.

Sorceress Paradox

Chapter One: Beginnings

 _[Instructor Tilmitt report to the bridge. Repeat, Instructor Tilmitt report to the bridge]_

Selphie rolled her eyes as her students whooped and whistled, teasing and asking their petite melee instructor what she blew up this time. "All right, all right folks, settle down," she laughed out, quite used to the jokes. "While I'm out practice defense and evasion techniques, and..." she paused for dramatic effect, a twinkle in her emerald eyes, "If any of you bail to make mischief for Instructor Dincht again, you'll be my sparing partners for a month, got it?" She nodded, pleased to see her students gulp in fear at the prospect. Selphie had a reputation for being insanely strong and brutal when it came to sparing, and her students were not fond of the idea having to spar with her. She left the training room to a chorus of subdued 'yes ma'am's.

 _{I wonder what they want from me?}_ Selphie speculated as she made her way to the Garden's central elevator. Since becoming an instructor over a year ago Selphie had only been summoned to the bridge twice. Once for a specialized SeeD mission as a test pilot for the new Estharian airship Niblheim, and again shortly after to be reprimanded for accidentally blowing up the new airship. _{How was I supposed to know it wasn't designed to match the Ragnorak's speed…}_ she silently fumed again as she waited for the elevator.

The elevator _ding_ 'd open and Selphie's eyes widened as she entered. Already waiting inside were her friends and fellow instructors Zell Dincht and Irvine Kinneas. _{What is going on?}_ she wondered.

As if reading her mind Zell nodded to her and asked, "Do you know what this is about? I got a text from Squall telling me to come to the bridge."

Irvine nodded and tilted his trademark cowboy hat, "I got a message on my terminal in the classroom from him, telling me the same thing, then I heard the P.A. call for you," he stated, smiling his most womanizing smile at Selphie. Zell noticed and groaned.

The brunette just shrugged, completely used to and unaffected by the cowboy's charm, "I don't know what it's about, only that it has to be serious for Squally to summon us." The three friends became quiet, remembering back to the last time all of them were on the same mission.

 _{It's been seven years since the Ultimecia Disaster, and almost as long since the three of us have been on a mission together,}_ Selphie thought as the elevator rose to the third floor.

After the defeat of Sorceress Ultimecia and her plan for Time-Compression, what the world deemed as the Ultimecia Disaster, the Six Heroes had disbanded their team, though not their close bonds. The team had consisted of Galbadia Garden sniper Irvine, Balamb Garden SeeDs Selphie, Zell, Quistis Trepe, and Commander Squall Lionheart, and the young sorceress Rinoa Heartily. Before the Disaster each of them had been exceptionally strong, with the exception of Rinoa, having been trained from childhood as soldiers. After the Disaster, the group had become insanely strong, to the point that newly-opened xenophobic Esthar and newly-toppled power-hungry Galbadia both feared them as a military threat and no longer represented neutrality that Garden stood for. To ease everyone's fear Squall had disbanded their perfect team and since had made sure to never put any of them in the same team or on the same mission.

Selphie looked up as Zell exclaimed, "Woah!" Again her green eyes widened in surprise as the elevator opened up on the third floor to show the last two females of their old team, the tall Quistis and the charismatic Rinoa.

"Oh my gosh Rin!" Selphie gushed as she quickly embraced the young sorceress. "I didn't even know you were back! It's great to see you!"

Rinoa smiled, "You too Selphie," her smile quickly became serious, "But I'm afraid it's not with good news."

"What happened?" Irvine asked. "Weren't you on a simple research assignment?"

Quistis shook her head, her blue eyes scanning the room, "Not here Irvine, we'll discuss this in a moment." Her head turned as the door to the bridge opened and Lieutenant Xu motioned for the group to follow.

Zell opened his mouth to say something, paused, then closed it, as if he had thought better of it. _{Yeah, Zell, I'm thinking the same thing,}_ Selphie thought as they followed Xu to the conference room connected to the bridge. _{What's with all the cloak and dagger stuff?}_ She glanced around her at her friends, _{I was called over the P.A., Zell was summoned through a text, and Irvine got an e-mail. Why did Squall use so many different methods to summon us. It's almost as if he didn't want everyone to know he had summoned all of us…}_

Selphie's suspicions were confirmed when the group entered the empty conference room. The small room was engulfed in an Odine Barrier. One of Odine's few inventions that wasn't solely dedicated to the control of sorceress powers, the barrier was designed to not only protect those within from physical and magical attacks, it was also designed to block all types of sensory penetration for the outside, so that no one, sorceress or otherwise, could see, hear, touch, or even sense with their mind what was going on inside. Selphie shivered as she entered the barrier and it scanned her biological signature. She always got the creepy crawlies whenever she entered this O. Barrier; a few years ago when it was first installed she had accidentally tried to cross the barrier before she was registered as 'safe personnel' and got a serious zap.

After entering the barrier they found the room wasn't really empty; their leader Squall had been in the room behind the barrier all along. Beside him was the infamous Dr. Odine himself. The small group of comrades took their seats at the table quietly, sensing the seriousness of the strange situation.

Squall stood, his gray eyes calm as he waited for Xu to close the door and take her place. He nodded to each of them in turn, saying "Thank you for coming. I apologize for all the secrecy, but what you're about to hear can't leave this group." He waited for the rest to nod their agreement, then turned to his wife Rinoa, "As you all know Rin was recently in Esthar doing research with Dr. Odine, what you don't know is what they were researching." He gestured to the sorceress, "Rin will you explain?"

The dark haired woman nodded and stood, "I know some of you are familiar with some of my teachings in my class," she started. Selphie and Quistis looked at each other; the three women would often discuss their various specialized classes over coffee dates. Rinoa's class was Philosophy of Hyne, Sorceresses and Sorceress Embodiment. A class they all believed to be vital to SeeDs and future SeeDs, so that they could understand the difference in Sorceresses and their various powers. Another underlying reason for the class, was to help spread the understanding that not all Sorceresses are evil. The last two Sorceress Wars, the most recent the Ultimecia Disaster, had caused a global fear and hatred of all Sorceresses. Rinoa smiled at them and continued. "One of my favorite lectures is the Chicken and the Egg question, in reference to the power of Sorceresses. My research with Dr. Odine was on that very theory," She leaned forward unto the table, becoming very grave. "And we stumbled onto a very scary and very possible connection between the beginning of the Sorceresses and Ultimecia..."


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer: I do not own Final Fantasy VIII or its characters.

Author's Note: I'm gonna try to make the chapters longer than I usually make them. Also, I am using spell check but if I miss any 'e's 'q's or spaces, forgive me, those three keys are glitchy…

Sorceress Paradox

Chapter Two: The Chicken or the Egg? _SCRAMBLED!_

"...We stumbled onto a very scary and very possible connection between the beginning of the Sorceresses and Ultimecia..." When that sentence came out of Rinoa's mouth, everyone stared at the sorceress, stunned. Everyone that is with the exception of Squall and Dr. Odine.

Quistis was even dumbfounded, _{Squall told me that Rin had discovered something_ _dangerous_ _relating to Ultimecia,_ _}_ she glanced at the silent commander, _{But I had no idea it would be this…}_

Selphie tilted her head, her emerald eyes confused, "Wait Rin, are you sure?' she questioned. "How could Ultimecia, the last Sorceress of all time, be connected to the beginning of all Sorceresses?"

Quistis smiled slightly, the petite brunette had a way with getting to the heart of the matter. As Rinoa smiled at Selphie and began to gather her papers to begin the explanation, Quistis glanced at the other members in the room that were hearing this information for the first time. Xu had an intense look in her eyes staring straight at the sorceress, Quistis knew Xu had a didactic memory and could count on the other lieutenant to remember every minute detail of the coming lecture. Irvine had an equally intense look, leaning forward on the table his arms crossed in front of him. Quistis knew the sharpshooter was intelligent, but often forgot that fact due to his womanizing laid back attitude. Zell, she found, was still reeling from the shock of Rinoa's earlier statement. Quistis sighed, making a mental note to get with the martial artist later to answer any questions he was sure to have.

Her attention was pulled back to Rinoa as the young woman pressed a button on the projection remote, turning on the projector and turning off the lights simultaneously. Rinoa gestured to the first image behind her, a simple image of an egg and a chicken, "As I said, it's related to this fundamental philosophy question. Which came first, the chicken or the egg?"

"The chicken of course," Zell interrupted, eliciting groans from either side of him. "I mean, ya know, the chicken cuz it has to lay the egg..."

Quistis rolled her eyes to the ceiling as she sighed, _{Here we go…}_ she thought as she glanced at Squall, who up to this point had shown no emotion but was now covering his face with his hand.

Rinoa, who was used to this type of answer in her classes, just shook her head and smiled, "Where does a chicken come from?" she asked simply.

Zell answered immediately, "An egg…" he paused as he realized what he said contradicted his earlier response. "Oh..."

Rinoa nodded, "Exactly," she clicked the projection remote again, changing the image to that of a woman with the tag ' _Sorceress'_ next to an egg-like blue orb labeled _'Sorceress Power'_. "We know that a sorceress gains her powers and abilities through Embodiment, the act of an older sorceress passing on her powers to a younger sorceress."

Rinoa clicked the remote again, this time an image of Hyne appeared. "Also, according to myths sorceresses are descendents of Hyne and therefore not 'human'." Another click, this time an image of herself and her predecessor Edea. Rinoa turned to the small group, "But that's not quite true. I'm obviously human, I was before Edea passed her powers to me, and I still am. The same is true for Edea and Ellone, as well as Adel," Rinoa gestured to Dr. Odine, "All four of us were at one point or another under the care of Dr. Odine."

At this, Irvine muttered under his breath, "Experiments of Dr. O, she means." Quistis elbowed him in the ribs.

Rinoa continued on smoothly, "During those various times Dr. Odine could find nothing in our DNA that even remotely suggested we were anything but human. In fact," another click, this time an image of Selphie and Quistis, "When Edea unconsciously passed on her powers, it could have easily been any of the women there at the time. I was just closest."

Rinoa turned to the group, "Considering this fact, both Dr. Odine and I believe the myth of Hyne creating sorceresses and their powers is largely incorrect, if not outright wrong from the get go." Rinoa paused to let that statement sink in. Rinoa sighed, went to press the remote again but stopped, saying "By taking Hyne out of the equation, we are left with the question, 'where did sorceresses and their power originate?'" With one final click of the remote, an image of Ultimecia appeared. "Our research into this question led us to analyze the various sorceress powers recorded throughout history. The result was that, even though each power was unique to that sorceress, they each fell into a small category based on the primary aspect of those powers. Psychic, Physical, and Elemental. Delving deeper we found that all three categories fell into one large category, Space-Time." Rinoa paused again, taking a deep breath, "We found at the core of each individual power, was the power generated from Time-Compression."

A thick and tense silence enveloped the room as Rinoa finished her lecture, the impact of her words seemingly smothering any and all exclamations and questions for the moment. Quistis was the first to recover, "Are you saying, that Time-Compression created the Sorceresses and their powers?" she asked incredulously.

Dr. Odine, spoke up, "Yez, in a zenze." He stood up and walked over to Rinoa, taking the remote and her place as speaker. "You zee, during Time-Comprezzion, all timez vere together at vonce, in ze zame place; ze past, prezent, and ze future. Ve vere told Ultimecia vas ze only vone who could zurvive in zat vorld." He raised his finger in the air, "But zat vas not ze case, you all vere able to enter Time-Comprezzion and defeat her and return ze vorld to normal. But zat very act, triggered a very large paradox."

The doctor clicked the remote, the image changed to two pictures of the planet, side by side. "As ve all know, during Time-Comprezzion, everyvone on ze planet, from beginning of time to ze last of it, ceazed to exizt, aside from you all and Ultimecia. Zat very act itself should have negated Ultimecia's very existence as vell, being zat novone had ever been born to birth her in ze first place, no other zorcerezz had exizted to pazz on their powerz to her. In fact, ze moment Time-Comprezzion had been achieved, our reality vaz torn apart, destroyed." The enthusiastic doctor didn't give his audience time to swallow that information before continuing on. "Zome of us know zis as fact. If you remember, after the vorld vaz restored, many people reported unuzual symptoms for monthz, from headaches, lozz of memoriez, altered memoriez, and even zome who inzizsted zat their life vaz not how it should be."

His audience nodded; each one of the SeeDs in the room had had some mission relating to those very instances shortly after the Disaster. Quistis' eyes narrowed, understanding starting to dawn on her. _{This explains_ _why that young man in Dollet had insisted SeeD investigate his claim that he and his wheelchair-bound sister had been experimented on. He kept saying that he was the one that had been permanently disabled and his sister had been the one with perfectly working legs. At the time, everyone I questioned that knew them confirmed that his sister had always been disabled. Even his sister confirmed it.}_ Quistis cringed a little inside, thinking now that maybe she had been too hasty in suggesting he be committed.

"My azziztants and I have been studying zeze cases for avhile now and vhen Mizz Heartily came to us viz her zeory, ze peicez started to fall into place," he pointed at the image. "You zee, ve believe zat vhen Time-Comprezzion vas achieved, our vorld, our reality, vas duplicated, to prevent ze paradox." He clicked the remote and the image became animated, showing one world, both images overlaid with the tag _'before Time-Compression'_ then the two images separated again with the tag _'after Time-Compression.'_ "Zis explains ze various symptoms experienced aftervards. Our vorld was copied, but like all copiez, it iz not an exact duplicate. Variouz changes, from minute to large, vere made." Another click and the image changed to that of Hyne again, "Among vhich vaz ze myth of Hyne and ze origination of zorcerezzez."

The small doctor was about to continue when Zell interrupted, irritated with the long lecture that seemed to be going in circles, "Ok doc, get to the point!"

Dr. Odine glared at Zell, "Zat iz vhat I am doing!"

Rinoa stood up, "Dr. Odine, let me take over, I'm sure your parched," she said charmingly.

Dr. Odine looked at her, smiled and nodded, "Very vell, you can explain to zem," he said as he took his seat again.

Rinoa cleared her throat, "Well, what the doctor is saying is this, to prevent the paradox from destroying space-time, the world was duplicated. The original world is where Ultimecia comes from, in that world Hyne truly did spawn the sorceresses and their powers. When Ultimecia achieved Time-Compression, our world was created, in effect negating the paradox of Ultimecia having no parents or being unable to inherit her sorceress powers." Seeing the confusion on her audiences' faces, she sighed. Looking around she spied a bowl of fruit. She grabbed an apple and an orange and held them up. "Ok, think of it as this, the original world, the world where Ultimecia is from is the apple. When the Disaster happened, reality warped, and created a new world, our world, the orange. Ultimecia's Time-Compression occurred on our world." She picked up a pen and pierced the apple with the end and the orange with the tip. "We know that to achieve Time-Compression, Ultimecia's consciousness and powers flowed from the future into the present, but it was from _her_ world's future into _our_ world's present." She saw understanding begin to creep into everyone's eyes and nodded, "To make it even more simple, our world is a duplicate, but a duplicate whose history started during the original's present. Therefore the original's future, where Ultimecia is from, was happening at the same time as our present." She paused, waiting for any questions to arise, when none did she continued. "During Time-Compression, Ultimecia's consciousness and powers spread throughout the past, present and future of our world. We know Ultimecia passed on some of her power to Edea in the past, but not all of it. We believe that her powers were passed down to various sorceresses throughout history, starting with the very first sorceress." She clicked the remote one final time, shutting of the projector and bringing back the lights. She concluded the lecture with, "Hence solving the Chicken and the Egg paradox regarding sorceress powers."

Squall, silent up to this point, put the final touches on the discussion with one line, "The scrambled egg came first..."


End file.
